Subject: Re: Building Static copy of ls

From: [email-masked] (John Attwood)
Date: Thu, 20 Mar 97 10:07:59 GMT

>If you read the solaris 2 faq there are good reason not to staically link 
>binaries that use nsl, intl etc, such as if you patch your computer, they may 
>not work, or be less secure.. or so I am lead to believe.
>

Surely this is an entirely spurious argument: if you patch your system
the copies of the libs in ~ftp are left entirely untouched unless you
manually update them. There is little difference between having to
recompile a statically linked executable or having to copy a dozen or
so libs every time you install a patch. Both processes could be
automated, but recompiling uses make and thus is already automated.
Either way, it's down to the sysadmin to remember that intervention is
necessary, though. Not having to touch dynamically linked executables
after a system patch is only true if they are using the system
libraries, which is not the case in a chrooted environment such as
anonymous ftp where they are using separate copies of the libraries.
-- 
John Attwood,  Computing Officer,      |  Voice +171 387 7050 X5028
MRC Human Biochemical Genetics Unit,   |  Fax   +171 387 3496
University College London,             |  Email [email-masked]
Wolfson House, 4 Stephenson Way,       |
London NW1 2HE, United Kingdom.        |  http://www.gene.ucl.ac.uk/~john